Truro dune restoration technique catches on in other coastal communities

Friday

Nov 15, 2013 at 12:01 AMNov 15, 2013 at 3:13 PM

Gordon Peabody is a man of influence. He’s got the wind working for him in several spots along the East Coast, and if his sand-collection system continues to garner attention he could soon be directing ocean breezes as far away as California.

Kaimi Rose Lum @klumBanner

Gordon Peabody is a man of influence. He’s got the wind working for him in several spots along the East Coast, and if his sand-collection system continues to garner attention he could soon be directing ocean breezes as far away as California.

Peabody is well known locally for his success in repairing a storm-torn dune at Ballston Beach, using a simple but effective technique he developed with his staff at Safe Harbor Environmental Services. By planting wooden shims on the beach in the pattern of native dune vegetation, trapping wind-blown sand, Peabody and his crew are able to channel storm energy in a direction that builds, rather than erodes, barrier dunes. Peabody calls the system “biomimicry,” because it’s modeled after natural processes.

“I’m uncomfortable taking credit for it, because the wind’s really doing all the work,” he said in an interview Monday.

At Ballston, the wind has been extremely industrious, adding 10 to 12 feet of sand per year to the damaged dune. And as news of the feat has spread, calls for help from coastal communities across the country have started to come in. The town of Newburyport recently sought Safe Harbor’s help in repairing an eroded shoreline at Plum Island, and in September Uri Driscoll, a conservationist from out West, paid a visit to Truro to see if biomimicry could help rebuild a blown-out barrier dune in the coastal town of Manila, Calif.

“It’s so adaptable, so adjustable. You’re not leaving wire in the sand. I think it’s got a lot of value, especially if it’s put in at a certain time of year when the wind is coming from a certain direction,” said Driscoll of Peabody’s method. In Manila, the erosion was caused by the systematic removal of dune grass that was considered invasive, Driscoll said, and his hope is that biomimicry can be used to restore enough height to the leveled dune that it can be revegetated and stabilized.

When he and his colleagues met with Safe Harbor earlier this fall, they were amazed at the progress the Ballston dune has made, Driscoll said. They had seen pictures of it before the biomimicry went in, and when they visited the actual site, “We stood there looking at this 25-foot-high dune going, ‘Wow, that’s pretty impressive,’” he said.

Last Thursday, meteorologist Todd Gutner and his camera crew from WBZ-TV (CBS) Boston came to see Ballston’s miracle dune for themselves.

Gutner “seemed genuinely fascinated by biomimicry’s basic simplicity. They filmed us installing the system in one area and adjusting the system by pulling the shims higher in an area where sand had collected,” Peabody said. “They filmed me about six times, just pushing a single shim into the sand.” The segment is expected to air as part of a winter weather special later this month, he said.

Peabody, who shares his method freely and is not interested in compensation, said he has also been contacted by an Eagle Scout in a Hurricane Sandy-ravaged New Jersey community who wants to rebuild a dune. “And I heard yesterday that [biomimicry] is finding its way to Australia,” he said.

While it has been embraced by some, the technique has met with its fair share of skepticism. When Driscoll installed some wooden stakes in the Manila dune over the summer to see if biomimicry would work there, the stakes were removed by proponents of the invasive dune grass removal who dismissed biomimicry as an “unsanctioned environmental experiment,” according to a blogger for the North Coast Journal of Humboldt County, Calif.

And Peabody said that it was pointed out to him “by someone who I really respect in the coastal geology world” that his technique is missing something called “biophysical feedback.” That means, essentially, that the wooden shims aren’t a true substitute for dune vegetation. “Each type of beach grass makes a different shape of dune,” said Peabody.

Peabody said he sees his sand-trapping system more as first aid for troubled coastal spots than as a permanent solution. “If you’re in an area that’s had dunes, you can use biomimicry to jack up the geomass, and then go ahead and plant vegetation when you get the elevation you’re looking for.”

The other criticism he’s heard, he said, is that overwash is a natural event and you shouldn’t interfere with it. He agrees, to a point. “We should remember that storm winds are one impact. People are another. When there are people running all over a dune like ants at a picnic, there will be an impact,” he said.

In the end, he said, “What we are dealing with here are towns that need protection.”